


the faintest whisper

by heyeucharis



Category: Horimiya
Genre: F/M, Gentle touches, Mostly Fluff, Oneshot, can be a missing moment, for tooruyuki nation, kawakawa?, mild idiots in love, tooruyuki, tooruyuki being wholesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-19 12:54:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29874975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heyeucharis/pseuds/heyeucharis
Summary: It happens very, very quickly. Thunder strikes. Yuki yelps.It does not go unnoticed, though.
Relationships: Ishikawa Tooru/Yoshikawa Yuki
Comments: 4
Kudos: 45





	the faintest whisper

It happens very, very quickly. Thunder strikes. Yuki yelps. 

It does not go unnoticed, though. She instantly feels three pairs of eyes unwittingly land on her, and the pink rushes to her face immediately after. 

Hori’s pen stops moving. “You afraid of thunder, Yuki?” 

Yuki stares at her best friend, sitting across her on the other side of the low coffee table. Hori’s brilliant brown hair is turning a pretty shade of golden from the sunbeam streaming in. “Ah...yeah? Just—just sudden, loud noises I guess.” 

Miyamura hums in agreement, looking a little shaken up himself, and Yuki’s grateful for the solidarity. Tooru’s house has these large floor-to-ceiling glass windows that, for all their grandeur, don’t seem to do a particularly good job at keeping the noise out, and yet Hori and Tooru look unbothered. Yuki off-handedly wonders if they can donate some of their nonchalance, or bravery—whatever—to her.

“Looks like rain,” Miyamura is saying, clicking a mechanical pencil as he does. “Wonder why there’s still sun out…”

_This is so pathetic._ Yuki exhales shakily, trying to ignore the way her heartbeat is still shamefully erratic. Junior high still haunts her, where she’d been laughed at for being so skittish, to the point where she’d just elected to hide her fears as much as possible. Why did she have to be scared of _this?_ Of all things? It’s just a clap of thunder. Logically speaking, it can’t hurt her. It _shouldn’t_ hurt her, just like how it barely affected everyone else. Hori has returned to her translating assignment, Miyamura is leaning sweetly into her side while asking a question, and just beside her, Tooru…

Tooru stares at her for a little bit, and she spies unusual softness in familiar eyes. Yuki already struggles with the art of being straightforward, but with Tooru, it’s…confusing. It’s full of surprises. Sometimes she feels braver with him, but other times she doesn’t understand how he makes her true feelings catch in her throat, and she’d want to smile them away, leave them unsaid. Now feels like the latter. _Why are you looking at me like that?_ she wants to ask, but doesn’t. 

Tooru keeps quiet, going back to his textbook, and to someone who didn’t know any better he’d look frighteningly uncaring. But for Hori and Miyamura, who have since left their homework to stare at Tooru staring at Yuki, they _do_ know better and they can tell from his furrowed eyebrows and worried lip that there’s something he’s simply not saying. 

Being next to Yuki, though, his silence sounds...rather conspicuous. Yuki grabs her pen again, trying to forget. Tooru worries his lip further. Hori and Miyamura observe, and share a knowing glance. 

Again, it happens very, very quickly. 

Tooru juts out his right elbow. “Yoshikawa, wanna hold m—”

Thunder strikes again. Much, _much_ louder this time. And Yoshikawa yelps again, but now she’s pressed up against his right side. Shivering like a frightened rabbit, hand having slipped in between his arm and holding onto him like a lifeline. 

The air stills, and the thunder passes. Yoshikawa’s trembling does not. Hori and Miyamura stare with an odd kind of wonder. 

“—my hand,” Tooru finishes under his breath.

The touch of her fingers is muffled by her long sleeves, but her hand is tight around his arm all the same. It makes the breath he was going to let go of stick in his throat, and for a moment he convinces himself that things will go back to normal in the next, that Yoshikawa will pull away just as abruptly as she held onto him. So it surprises him further when Yoshikawa doesn’t shy away like he’d thought she would, but instead hides her face behind his shoulder. In fear or embarrassment, he can’t tell. Whatever it is, it has no business making his heart race like that, and he suddenly wants to punch it down to make it stop. 

He’d asked Sengoku once. _Prez, what do you like about Ayasaki?_

The red-haired boy had looked flustered in a way Tooru had never seen him before. Sengoku turned away from him bashfully, and Tooru almost wanted to apologise for asking. The reply had confused him. 

_She...ah, she makes me want to protect her._

Sengoku had to hurriedly clarify that it wasn’t him being misogynistic. 

“Protecting others is a job for brave people. I’m not— _don’t laugh, Ishikawa!_ It’s just...I _want_ to be braver, just to make sure she’s okay.” 

_Is that what this is?_ He wonders, staring dumbly down at Yoshikawa curved tightly into his right side, looking smaller than he’s ever seen her. He hesitated just now, trying to figure out why and how Yoshikawa could look...could look so _sad_ from just one stroke of thunder. She hadn’t said a word, but he felt like he could hear her asking _why’re you staring_ anyways. _Just...wanting to make sure you’re okay..._

He shudders inwardly; that was _so_ cheesy. It wasn’t his type of thing to say, not aloud at least. The guys in class probably wouldn’t let him hear the end of it if they catch wind of something like that coming out of his mouth. He bites his tongue a lot because of that, but somehow around Yoshikawa he never seems to know what’s best to do. Will she be weirded out like the guys would be? Maybe. He’s not sure. So, then...what _could_ he say? What else could he do? 

Outside is quiet, with the smell of impending rain having somehow found its way into the living room. Yuki can feel Tooru holding his breath, sitting still and staring down at her, and a tingle of dread begins to twist into her. _Why_ did she do that? As if she wasn’t embarrassing enough already! And now— _one second, two, three…_ what will he do when he runs out of air? Push her away? No one likes cowards. What should _she_ do? She hasn’t moved; hasn’t dared to, afraid of what she might find in Tooru’s expression. But Tooru—Tooru is full of surprises. 

“It bothers you that much?” His voice is gentler than she’s ever heard it, and it drums up a new flurry of nerves and fluster. It’s a nice kind of nervous, though, she thinks. 

“Don’t laugh,” Yuki mumbles, her voice muffled by his sweater. 

Tooru does anyway, but there’s no mockery to be heard. Instead, it sounds soft, shy and golden, like sun after rain, slow-dancing with the clouds. His laugh is almost tangible, with the way she feels it ripple through his body, seeping into her own like warmth seeking winter. It makes the trembling come to rest.

“Geez, Yoshikawa, you’re so skittish. Really like a mouse.” Yuki freezes, but then he reaches out to pat her head like he always does, fingers threading tenderly into her hair that he _knows_ she put effort into this morning, and all Yuki feels is the butterflies beating their wings harder. 

She lifts her head, and Tooru grins down at her like she’s the soft, shy, golden one. 

“S’okay, you can hold on to me whenever.” _Whenever you want_ , he wants to say, but the words lodge in his throat with uncharacteristic shyness. Yoshikawa doesn’t say anything but squints at him slightly, before her eyes widen with some sort of revelation. She begins to move, and for a moment he fears he’s freaked her out. Then her hand unconsciously drops down the length of his forearm and finds new purchase at his wrist. And just like that, Yoshikawa slows the world to a standstill, and it sits awaiting his reaction. _What now?_ But she answers that for him with a question. 

“You mean that? Tooru.” 

_That’s easy._ He doesn’t bite his tongue this time. “Mm. Yeah.”

Yoshikawa sniffs. “Okay,” and her sweater sleeve curls further round his wrist, surer of its grip and resting place than before. She reaches for her book on the table, leg bumping flush against his. And against his better judgment, Tooru lets his hand fall to rest lightly on her thigh, because somehow around Yoshikawa he never seems to know what’s best to do, but all he _does_ know is that he doesn’t want to see her scared anymore.

That translates out into three small words: “Okay, with this?” 

When he turns to look, Yoshikawa is staring wide-eyed back at him. But she doesn’t look _scared_ anymore, or sad, just...surprised. _In a good way_ , he thinks, suddenly realising how pretty Yoshikawa looks with a slight pink fluttering across the top of her cheekbones. That must mean he did the right thing. 

Yuki finds herself at a loss. Thank God she chose to wear sweatpants today, or this would’ve played out so differently. This. _This._ Tooru ruffles her hair, touches her shoulder, holds her hand— _sometimes_ —but this feels _new_ , new in a way that catches her completely off guard and graciously tilts the axis of her little world. And he’s looking at her expectantly, waiting for her answer. 

_Okay, with this?_ It surprised her, but not in the way thunder does. _A nice kind of nervous,_ she thinks again, and feels a blush chasing away the shock on her face. It’s not like she doesn’t like it, not at all, but—just...

“D-don’t do stuff like that without telling me first…” 

Tooru lets out a breath of laughter, eyes gleaming with their usual mischief. His palm is a reassuring weight against her thigh. Yuki swears he somehow sounds relieved.

“Whatever you say, Yoshikawa.” 

(She is, too.)

Tooru’s fingers flutter idly against her sweatpants, tapping irregularly as he returns his attention to his Modern Japanese textbook that’s now propped up against his knees. There _was_ a spark at first, and the butterflies leapt, but now it’s smoothed over into a warmth that feels kind of familiar, kind of inevitable, as if this moment was always intended to happen; as if they are both right where they should be.

Yuki goes back to her work, too. Her heart lets out the faintest whisper of _go hold his hand, Yuki_ , but she pushes this one down, and this time she doesn’t feel bad about it. One day, maybe, she _will_ reach for Tooru’s hand, properly, but for now, she’s alright where she is; where they are. The way Tooru settles against her, with quiet, rested confidence, tells her he thinks the same. 

And outside, the rain clouds settle down, too, proper. 

“Oh to be young,” Hori muses aloud with a shit-eating grin. Next to her, Miyamura chuckles, and they share a smirk and another knowing look. 

Yes, it happened very quickly, but luckily both Tooru and Yuki are familiar with the art of unspoken words. 

_Can I protect you?_ Tooru is saying. 

And Yuki replies, _yeah, I want you to.  
_

**Author's Note:**

> hi! thank you for reading my first fic on here. horimiya successfully pulled me in and tooru/yuki has stolen my heart (i like to call them kawakawa). hope you enjoyed this piece!


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